Abstract: The birth year of Empress Liu of Emperor Zhenzong has two accounts in the historical records of the Song Dynasty:the second year of the Kaibao and the fourth year of the Taiping Xingguo.Since the records state that Liu was “an orphan at birth”,by analyzing the death year of her father Liu Tong,and the year of Liu “entering the residence of Prince Xiang at the age of fifteen”,it is deduced that she was born in the latter half of the third year or the beginning of the fourth year of the Taiping Xingguo.She entered the residence of Prince Xiang in the fourth or fifth year of the Chunhua and was fifty-five or fifty-six years old at her death in the second year of the Mingdao,contrary to the sixty-five years recorded in Biography of Empress Concubine in the History of the Song Dynasty.The contradictions in the Song Dynasty official records regarding Empress Lius birth year may have arisen from attempts to cover up the fact that she had given birth when she was first married to Gong Mei.

Key words: the Song Dynasty, Empress Liu, birth year, correction